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EPA Awards $400,000 to Assess Fall River, Mass.

(Boston, Mass. – August 17, 2012) EPA is providing two Brownfields assessment grants, totaling $400,000, to Fall River. One grant will be used to assess Hazardous Substance contaminated sites and the other will be used to assess Petroleum contaminated sites. The goal of these assessments is to lead to the clean up & sustainable redevelopment of Brownfields sites, thus improving the economy and quality of life in the City.The funding is part of more than $17 million in EPA Brownfields investments across the six New England states announced by EPA.

The assessment grant funds will be used to determine the contamination of the property located at the corner of Bedford and High Street. The site is a former police station that has been vacant for 15 years. Establishing the level of contamination will enable the City to redevelop the land and revitalize the community.

“EPA Brownfields funding helps strengthen the economic foundation and is a catalyst for further growth in our communities,” said Curt Spalding, regional administrator of EPA New England’s office. “Cleaning and revitalizing contaminated sites helps create jobs, and can help a community to create new businesses and neighborhood centers, while making our environment cleaner and the community healthier.”

“The Commonwealth of Massachusetts considers itself fortunate to have received $6.75 million of the $69.3 million in Brownfields assessment/cleanup grants and revolving loan funds (RLF) awarded nation-wide by the Environmental Protection Agency earlier this year. This dollar amount represents nearly 10 percent of the overall funds and is far and away the highest total of any state,” said EEA Undersecretary for Environment Philip Griffiths. “We congratulate the City of Fall River on their $400,000 community-wide assessment grant and look forward to continuing to work with the City and our state and federal partners through not only the assessment of these contaminated parcels but also their eventual cleanup and redevelopment.”

Since the beginning of EPA’s Brownfields Program, in New England alone EPA has awarded 296 assessment grants totaling $72.7 million, 62 revolving loan fund grants and supplemental funding totaling $68.4 million and 213 cleanup grants totaling $47 million. These grant funds have paved the way for more than $1.45 billion in public and private cleanup and redevelopment investment and for 9,756 jobs in assessment, cleanup, construction and redevelopment on over 2200 sites across New England.

Nationally, the figures are impressive: As of August 2012, EPA’s Brownfields assistance has leveraged more than $18.3 billion in cleanup and redevelopment funding from a variety of public and private sources and helped create approximately 76,500 jobs. More than 18,500 properties have been assessed, and over 750 properties have been cleaned up. These investments and jobs target local, under-served and economically disadvantaged neighborhoods – places where environmental cleanups and new jobs are most needed.